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Outlook Express
Format and Personalize your message |
Outlook Express is a great mail program, you can
personalize every message you send, and make sending and
receiving an easier task.
If you understand all the Outlook Express capabilities,
you will never replace it with another program, because
it has almost everything
you need.
Outlook Express allows you to format your message, old
mail programs were similar to NotePad, you could only
write text.
With programs such as Outlook Express you can use colors,
alignment, Fonts, even add images. When working with
fonts make sure you don't choose anything out of the
ordinary, the recipient must have the font you've used to
view the effect.
Windows has a large variety of fonts, use them.
Use
the formatting toolbar above the message body to write
elegant email messages.
To insert a picture click  make sure
that the image is not "heavy", better use GIF
or JPEG and keep it under 50K
In the Picture window press Browse to locate the
image you want to insert, under Layout
set an Alignment (Baseline, Left,
right...) and Border thickness if you want -this
will add a dark border to your image.
Under Alternate
Text write your picture description:
the description appears in case the recipient did not
manage to view the picture inside the message. Old mail
programs handle pictures only as an attachment, thus you
cannot view images inside the message body.
Specify Horizontal/Vertical Spacing to separate your
image from text in case you've inserted the image inside
a text block.
When you finish click OK. To change the
picture format settings,
right-click the image and select Properties, to delete the
image simply select and press Delete on your keyboard.
You
can also add internet addresses to your messages, once
clicked the browser is launched, no need to copy/paste
like in the old days.
Just type the address, the text turns to underlined-blue
indicating a hyperlink.
To modify the address, press  . You will understand hyperlink in FrontPage
Tutorial.
Write down some text e.g "website" select it
and press on Hyperlink icon, type the address in URL
field and press OK.
Instead of
writing the whole address in the message you can write a
name and give it a hyperlink. When the recipient clicks
on "website",
the browser immediately opens the page on the Internet.
Quite useful when the internet address is lengthy.
PS: The formatting
toolbar is very similar to the toolbar of a word processor such as WordPad
You can use Undo/Redo, Copy/Cut,
Paste, Select all.
Adding a Signature to your messages
If you always end your messages with a signature: name,
contact info, some motto, let Outlook Express do it automatically.
Click Tools>>Stationery
, under Signature
press Signature button.
On the
top of window check "Add this signature to all
outgoing messages"
only if you want to add the signature automatically to
all messages.
You have two options: write the text in Text field or use
a file (.txt, .html) you've prepared in advance.
If you checked "Add this signature..", every
time you Compose Message, the text signature is added to
your message automatically, if not press  in your message window to add the
signature when you finish composing the email.
Another
interesting signature feature is Personal
Business Card ,
it allows you to add your
contact info from Address Book into any message, just
make sure you've created your own entry in Address Book:
Name and email address, phone....
In Stationery window, press Signature button and Check
"Add card to all outgoing messages"
under Personal Business Card (vCard),
click New to create your
personal entry in Address Book if you didn't do it yet,
click OK, Apply then press Ok to go back to
main program. When you Compose Message and you'll notice this icon
in the header of your message,
this is you Personal Business Card, click it and select open to view your
contact info.
When you send the message the Personal
Business Card goes with it.
Adding a Personal Business Card is more efficient than
just a text signature.
PS: The Personal
Business Card is in fact a file with .VCF extension,
it
can be viewed with many popular mail programs
e.g
Netscape Messenger.
Compose a message with Stationery
Outlook
Express even adds more life to your email messages with
pre-designed templates called Stationery
that suit all your occasions.
Click on the arrow near Compose
Message icon and choose from 7 listed
stationeries, click More Stationery for more designs.
A Stationery includes special fonts, pictures...
You can even design your own Stationery, but remember to
choose Windows default fonts. If you use a font that's
not available on the recipient's computer he won't be
able to see the effect you've created.
To create a stationery, simply Compose Message add some
text, insert a picture using Insert Picture icon, next
click File>>Save As and choose HTM or
HTML file type.
Every stationery is stored at C:\Program Files\Common
Files\Microsoft Shared\Stationery by default, you
can use another location to save your own stationeries:
create a folder
in Stationery main directory - call it MyStationery- and
save all your designs.
If you have pictures in your stationeries, make sure you
put all images in the same folder.
You might want to add a background image to your message,
click Format>>Background, press Picture... You can also add
colors from Color menu.
Click Format>>Style and choose your
message format: Heading, Menu List, Formatted. Outlook
Express will automatically change fonts, alignment to fit
the style.
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